Lateral Transmissions

Dog-breeding, the colors of pigeons, beaver dams, and beehives. These were culled from the wide array of examples Darwin uses to propose evolution by means of natural selection. Typical of former renaissance writers, Darwin wrote with long sentences and erred on the side verbosity. In order to get into his work, you have to slow your mind and get it into a certain flow. Similar to many great writers, his volumes of work now might seem to the modern reader overbearing and archaic, overweighed by infinite trivial examples. But on the contrary, his examples demonstrate how evolution is all around us, in the everyday and in the mundane. And furthermore, where was Darwin supposed to start?

You see, since reading Robert Pirsig, I’ve become absolutely hung up on this notion of lateral truths. We often try to construct our lives in order to move straight forward, but Pirsig argued that there’s more to be gained from lateral movement. The movement straightforward, he argues, simply produces more and more things – be it facts or products – atop a weak edifice of previous things. Whereas lateral movement seeks to strengthen such edifices before going forward. I think that’s why I’ve been hesitant to write about the same topics both across blog posts and within them. Unfortunately I often stop and stutter in my writing, both in the typing and in my thoughts, going back and forth and checking my ideas in various ways. I apologize for any inconvenience, as it's anything but convenient for myself. But the point is that it’s not about adding on top, it’s about consolidating seemingly disconnected pieces across a wide array of phenomena. That’s where my mind seems to be gravitating so that's where I'll go.

Darwin began his scientific career as a barnacle expert, supposedly based on the advice that in order make any scientific contribution to the world you have to narrow your focus. He was heavily influenced by geologist Charles Lyell, who set forth similar principles as Darwin’s in his study of rock-formations across the world. On Darwin's formative Voyage of the Beagle, he inspected various islands and peninsulas. Supposedly Darwin brought 3 books on the trip: Lyell’s Principles of Geology, Milton’s Paradise Lost, and the bible. In piecing together The Origin of Species, he also met with dog breeders and a London-based pigeon-watching society.

When you look at all the separate pieces of evidence that yielded Darwin’s conception of evolution – of which the above are a small sample – you have to ask yourself where you don’t see evolution. It’s uncannily similar to religious arguments for the existence of God – just look around you, can’t you see that there's evidence of Him everywhere?

Darwin’s theory of evolution – and maybe even people's belief in God – both serve to consolidate seemingly disparate things. It’s atop these edifices that we’re then genuinely able to move forward for some time.

Adam Smith also had an uncanny ability to construct theory atop the seemingly mundane. In a stroke of literary genius, he began his multi-volume work by discussing pin-manufacturing in Europe. This topic would certainly seem pointless to most people, particularly ivory tower theorists, but that was exactly the point - that even in such a small everyday example, you can see the workings of the division of labor. Shakespeare achieved a similar feat of specificity in his line:

How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is
To have a thankless child (King Lear, Act I, Scene IV)

As a professor once told me, consider how that line would've fallen apart if you replaced "teeth" for "tooth". But if Smith's pin-making example was merely a rhetorical gimmick or a literary hook, then he would have dived straight into abstract theory with little or no return to the real world. Instead, Smith constantly goes back to the real world to support and test his developing ideas. And this gets at the heart of the study of economics, which is to pinpoint the wide-ranging and long-term effects of policy decisions on areas as specific as pin-making. (Pun intended, but it's not really a pun due to the shared meanings of 2 words).

Evolution and capitalism are unfortunately often discussed in platitudes as ideologies. But what I love about Darwin and Smith is that in their writings you can see their theories organically growing out of their observations of the world. Not that this makes their theories automatically correct, but it reveals an honesty that’s too often missing in intellectual discussion.

A lot of writing these days is reactionary and steeped in hatred – this is particularly the case in Karl Marx, whose writings have succeeded more as a polemic against the upper-class than an applicable economic system. Whenever I detect too much spite in a book or an editorial I get a sense that it has little to teach me. All that Darwin and Smith were reacting to was nature right in front them; Thomas Sowell has a similar honesty in his writings as well.

In a few passages in Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Pirsig will be talking to someone who disagrees with him, and the 1st thought that will come to my mind will be, “Oh that other person is so wrong.” This is because Pirsig builds his case so well in the book. But Pirsig will go on to say, “And in a way they were completely correct.” It’s not just another rhetoric gimmick, because in time you come to see how in that way they were completely correct. When you can see how everyone is correct in their own sense, then you can really get to the bottom of things. It harks back to using Aristotles' law of non-contradiction to your advantage. The law states: "It is impossible for the same thing to belong and not to belong at the same time to the same thing and in the same respect". What you have to realize, however, is that one person's opinion in favor of something is not the opposite as someone else's opinion against it: They're both true in their own sense, what differs is that sense. And it's that sense that you have to drag your mind to.

What I love about all these authors is that they’re not writing with an axe to grind. The benefit of reading such original sources like Darwin and Smith isn’t that they presented the perfect the version of their theories, it's that they truly saw their theory manifested throughout nature over and over and over again. They were thinking in the right sense. And in doing so, they consolidated phenomena, made the world simpler not more complex, and laid the groundwork for others to build upon. They weren’t moving up, they were trying to get to the bottom of things. There's an aesthetic appreciation for this as well; it's why repetition, used correctly, can be so powerful. Consider the role of repetition in learning or in music. Choruses in songs aren't just effective because they're good in and of themselves, they're effective because when you return to them your mind is slightly different from when it last experienced it.



This is what I’ve been trying to do recently. It recently struck me that the solution to most problems in life – be them intellectual or personal – is to stop and think to yourself, “What’s really going on here? What’s underlying the manifestation I’m seeing in front of me?” It’s a sort of analysis, or a division of labor in the mind so to speak. In my day-to-day life, when I face personal problems, I realize that my mind goes off and I forget to analyze, or I’m not analyzing correctly. Maybe I’m just over-thinking things. But it seems like the world's problems are all just due to a lack of clarity.

Ironically I realize that the last sentence may be vague, unclear. Pirsig expresses a similar sentiment when he describes an instructional manual he's saved over the years. The manual begins, "Assembly of Japanese bicycle require great peace of mind." Pirsig describes this instruction as both the best and the worst instruction he's ever seen: It contains nothing specific to putting together the bike, but it's a great, perhaps even essential, piece of advice for piecing together the bike, and in that sense, it has everything to do with putting together the bike. Pirsig goes on:

Peace of mind isn't at all superficial, really...It's the whole thing. That which produces it is good maintenance; that which disturbs it is poor maintenance. What we call workability of the machine is just an objectification of this peace of mind. The ultimate test's always your own serenity. If you don't have this when you start and maintain it while you're working you're likely to build your personal problems right into the machine itself.

So it’s not just analysis in the classical sense. Sometimes you have to ask yourself about general impressions that you get, make deductions based on them, and then follow those paths down to analysis. Like impressionistic art, you’re feeling a feeling, looking at a whole, and then diving down and asking yourself about versions of meaning. Which is why there's little to gain when at the bottom of things is an emotion like hatred, spite, or an attempt to maintain one's opinion rather than to learn about the real world, the latter of which should always be the focus. I’m sure that Darwin thought of evolution before he actively sought many of the examples in his book; it’s just that after he thought of his theory, he still kept his feet firmly planted on the ground.

-KJ

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Media (in order of appearance)

Photo: (1) Dauschund evolution, 01/03/2006, Colin Purrington; (2) Paloma, 06/30/2008, by Jaoa da Luna; (4) Barnacles, 01/27/2007, by Alanna@VanIsle; (5) lateral pass in football; (6) Shark tooth fossil, 08/27/2007, howzey; (7) Impression, soleil levant, 1872, by Claude Monet; (8) water lilly pads, 11/25/2005, Sarah Macmillan.

Video: Music video, 09/18/2007, gatojph4, of the song "Somthing" by The Beatles from the 1969 album Abbey Road. Sphere: Related Content

Top 15 of 2008

I thought about doing one of those year-end lists (like best CDs of the year) but I'm never very in touch with what's been released any given year. And furthermore half the time I find myself amazed by old things as if they were new (like a few years ago when I discovered Marvin Gayes' 1971 R&B classic, What's Goinig On). Society has a strong preference for the new, but sometimes old ideas can seem all the more relevant. So I decided to make a list of just top stuff in my life this year. Some are ideas and areas of study while others are new media and entertainment. Think of them as influencers in my life this year. In that sense, they're all things that proved to be novel to me in 2008 (that's why you won't find the sun rising) like little surprises or discoveries for the year. And in that sense as well I hope some of them you might find novel in your life.

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15. Dogs

Previously I never understood why people become so attached to them, though I never gave it much thought. But with new roommates I'm now living with a bunch of dogs and they’re a whole lot of fun like good buds. Dogs definitely make life just a bit richer.

14. The Washington Redskins

Being fully away from any form of school I’ve been able to get back into football. I enjoyed following the Skins throughout high school, but now that my mind’s a bit more matured I suddenly see there’s so much more to the game. This has become my new religion insofar as I set aside time each Sunday and think about it all week...and insofar as it’s not really a religion.

13. The Stock Market

Stock prices fluctuate in relation to demand for them not in relation to how good a company is. On a very intuitive level, this has never made sense to me, and it still doesn’t. But this year I’ve become intrigued with finding good intro books, reading about the market, researching companies, and even buying my first couple of shares. It’s essentially a mind-puzzle, a very tempered and controlled form of gambling. But boy is it intriguing. Sometimes I’ll just go to finance.google.com and watch the numbers change.

12. iTunes Genius

iTunes Genius is like an automated DJ who works with your digital music collection. You “play a song, click the Genius button, and iTunes creates a playlist of other songs from your library that go great together. Genius playlists help you discover songs in your library you never knew you had — and rediscover forgotten favorites.” Each song transition is tasteful and perhaps even artistic. It’s not perfect as it doesn’t recognize every song, and you can only use it for one song at a time. But its playlists really rival my own, some of which I've spent some time on. Even if you prefer to make your own mixes, you can use Genius to generate new ideas when you're stuck.
11. Motley Fool Caps

Motley Fool CAPS is an addictive stock market stimulator in which you vote on which stock picks will out- or under-perform the S&P. It’s as close as you’ll get to a true social networking community focusing on the stock market. And it’s taught me a good bit the market, both through making picks and reading others’ commentary. Tons of people use it and many stocks have thousands of predictions. For instance, Apple is currently the most frequently rated stock with 19,512 members for it and 1,593 members against it. TMF collects the data to generate all sorts of stats on players and stocks. It's only been around since 2006, and they're constantly tweaking it for the better. No one is even sure yet how it’ll turn out: Will it provide accurate real-world predictions? Will the highest rated stocks win out in the long run? In the meanwhile though who cares because it’s more fun than real investing.

10. Good cappuccinos

I’m not one to make elite aesthetic distinctions – they're often just puffs of ego and semantics. But this year a friend introduced me to a coffee shop that makes “real” cappuccinos and boy what a difference. Ones that look like this:

Cappuccinos are supposed to be thick and made with whole milk. The whole point in adding milk is so the dairy fat can bring out the flavor of the coffee. I'm hooked, and Starbucks' – who recently made skim milk their default for cappuccinos – now taste pretty empty to me.

9. metacritic.com

Metacritic.com combines critics' reviews on any given movie, music album, video game, or TV show. Each item gets a combined score across all critics, similar to rottentomatoes but with more media and a more user-friendly layout. I’ll often check it out before – and sometimes after – seeing or purchasing related media. The service is topnotch, since being bought by CBS, who've supplied it with more than adequate bandwidth, better quality control, and new features.

8. Coldplay’s album Viva la Vida

Like a revelation unfolded in sound. The collaboration between Coldplay and producer(/ambient maestro) Brian Eno worked perfectly. Coldplay and Eno are each intellectual aurally-aware introverts – sometimes to a fault – but here they build off each other quite well.



7. Improv acting classes

A few months ago I capriciously decided to give improv acting classes a try, as inspired through this article at CNN. It's taught me some unique life lessons, which I wrote about previously, but moreso it’s just a great release.

6. Slumdog Millionaire

The world is getting more connected, and we could only go on for so long before some artsy director pondered "why not make an American version of a Bollywood film?", and Slumdog Millionaire is the glorified result. An intense journey through the deepest reaches of poverty and fantasy, it’s the sort of film that could only have been released – or made money – this decade. Americans are truly getting smarter with each passing generation. Movies like Slumdog Millionaire or the Dark Knight are too complex and edgy to have been widely accepted a couple of decades ago. I loved them. We’re demanding more from pop-culture Mecca’s like Hollywood, and they’re giving us the goods. For more see Steven Johnson’s book Everything Bad Is Good for You: How Today's Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter. Check out Slumdog's soundtrack as well.

5. iTunes audio-books

I enjoy music and my iPod gives me freedom to listen to it anywhere. But I’ve recently begun digging iTunes’ audio-books as much as its music. At first I thought that I’d rather just listen to my favorite tunes everywhere and get into a groove. But audio-books have slipped into my daily iPod use with surprising ease. Just be sure to pick ones that aren’t too complex to listen to on the go. For example, an audio version of Newton’s Principia Mathematica won't work.

4. New Balance motion control sneakers

A few months ago I decided to give these shoes a go. They're called motion control shoes, because they have extra support around the arch in order to force your foot into correct pronation. They’ve completely corrected my posture, solved a running injury that I’ve had for years, and allowed me to run again. Who would’ve thought? The New Balance store by me has exceptional customer service as well, far exceeding similar high-end running shoe stores that I tried.

"Graphite Rollbar® is a boomeranging positioned piece of graphite in the midsole which maximizes rearfoot stability. Rollbar can be combined with a TPU medial and/or lateral post for motion control."

3. Economics

Economics suddenly intrigues me to no end. I don’t know what it is, but this topic seems to pervade everything. This year I’ve spent some time trying to finding the right books to teach myself about economics, and so far my picks have exceeded my expectations. Among the top is Thomas Sowell’s Basic Economics.

2. Sleep

This year I’ve reached new plateaus in how good my sleep feels. Wrote Vladimir Nabokov, “Sleep is a rose the Persians say.” (For more see a previous post).

1. Robert Pirsig's Zen & the art of Motorcycle Maintenance

I've returned to this book for the first time since a teen and it hits the spot like a popsicle on a hot day. I first read it a decade ago but it seems so much more relevant now. You can feel yourself learning with each page. And I even see how its lessons – which I’d forgotten explicitly came from the book – left their mark on my thinking since I was teenager, such as: the importance of analysis, both regarding its benefits and limits; the notion of honest work; quality and gumption; the limits of ego, opinion, and rigid-thinking. Other lessons are particularly relevant to my life now: the notion of moving laterally in life instead of forward; that roadblocks in life or in the mind are equally or more important than success; the severe limits of the empirical sciences. His discussion on lateral movement is exactly what I find so fascinating about free markets and alternative uses of scarce resources. But the book's reach extends far beyond.

-KJ
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Media (in order of appearance):

Photo: (1) Jason Taylor, 08/16/2008, jf; (2) iTunes Genius logo; (3) CAPPUCCINO, 07/22/2007, by kina3; (4) Movie poster from the 2008 film Slumdog Millionaire, fair use rationale to provide commentary on film; (5) 365/365: Audiobooks, 01/09/2008, by David D Muir; (6) New Balance motion control technology; (7) Cover from Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

Video: (1) Music video from caleismachinegun of the song "Lost" by Coldplay from the 2008 album Viva La Vida. Sphere: Related Content